Bruins win thriller, 3-2

The Bruins had the Sabres teetering on their skates after recording a pair of stirring, come-from-behind victories over the holiday weekend.

They delivered what almost certainly was the knockout blow last night, rallying from two goals down in the third period before handing the Sabres a devastating, 3-2 double-overtime defeat in their opening-round playoff series before a raucous, sold-out gathering of 17,565 at TD Garden.

The Bruins now own a commanding, 3-1 lead in this best-of-seven affair. They can close it out tomorrow in Buffalo. Game 6, if necessary, would be here Monday.

“It’s definitely nice, but the last one is the hardest,” rookie defenseman Johnny Boychuk said after another hard-working effort that produced five blocks, two hits and an assist in 32:58 of ice time.

“So we really can’t get too high after this one. But it is an important victory for us. Now we have three cracks at it.”

The Bruins are 14-1 all-time when leading a best-of-seven series, three games to one.

David Krejci, Patrice Bergeron and, at 7:41 of the second overtime, Miroslav Satan delivered the goals.

The decisive strike came on, of all things, the power play as the Sabres were shorthanded after getting caught with too many men on the ice.

The Bruins had been 5 for 59 with the man advantage over their last 20 games dating back to the regular season. They were 2 for 5 last night.

Michael Ryder took an outlet pass from goalie Tuukka Rask in the neutral zone and proceeded to make his way up the right boards.

“I had a bit of ice and knew there wasn’t much time on the power play,” Ryder recalled.

He slid the puck across to a wide-open Satan, who benefited immensely from Marco Sturm’s drive to the net. Ryan Miller, of Team USA fame, had made a spectacular save to deny Satan in the first OT, one the Bruin winger couldn’t get out of his head.

“Well, I tried to beat myself up,” Satan said. “I kept thinking about it, but he just made a great save on it. You know, it’s… I don’t think there’s too many goalies who could have stopped it, but he recovered quickly and, you know, I couldn’t do it any faster.”

Rask, the rookie, once again showed he’s got the goods. The Finnish phenom turned aside 35 shots while pitching a shutout over the final 60-plus minutes and outdueling Miller for the third straight game. Oh, yeah — that assist on the game-winner was the first by a goalie in an overtime playoff game in eight years.

“Well, Tuukka is pretty unbelievable,” Ryder said. “He makes the big save when you need it. He’s pretty poised and doesn’t panic. When he’s out of position, he really isn’t out of position because he’s so calm.”

The Sabres got goals from Tim Kennedy in the first period and ex-Bruin Steve Montodor in the second.

Regulation ended with the shots tied at 25-25. Both teams had eight in the first period, eight in the second, and nine in the third.

The Bruins definitely made theirs count in the third.

Krejci broke the ice when he put a rebound past a screened Miller at 2:07 to make it 2-1.

Bergeron, who had an assist on Krejci’s goal, tied it up at 2 just over four minutes later, spinning around on the left side and beating Miller between the pads for his second goal in as many games.

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